Broken yarn winding apparatus

ABSTRACT

In winding a great number of filament yarns or tows in position parallel to each other after treatments such as drawing and heatsetting, a rotatable disc having at least two rollers coming in contact with the yarn is disposed between the last roller available for said treatments to the yarn and a take-up apparatus. Said rollers are used interchangeably with each other by rotating said disc, and when the yarn has wrapped itself around one of the rollers owing to yarn breakage or loosening, the roller with the wrapped yarn is replaced by the other roller by rotating the disc to insure continuity of operations.

[ 1 May30,1972

[54] BROKEN YARN WINDING APPARATUS [72] Inventors: Kinyu Ishlda;Yssuhiro Oknmura, both of Matsuyama-shi, Japan Teijln Limited, Umeda,Kita-ku, Osaka, Japan [22] Filed: Sept. 15, 1969 [21] Appl. No.: 857,728

{73] Assignee:

{56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 3,156.396 1 1/1964 Snyder etal "226/17 Primary Examiner-Allen N. Knowles Assistant ExaminerGene A.Church Attorney-Wenderoth, Lind & Ponack ABSIRACT In winding a greatnumber offilament yarns or lows in position parallel to each other aftertreatments such as drawing and heat-setting, a rotatable disc having atleast two rollers coming in contact with the yarn is disposed betweenthe last roller available for said treatments to the yarn and a take-upapparatus. Said rollers are used interchangeably with each other byrotating said disc, and when the yarn has wrapped itself around one ofthe rollers owing to yarn breakage or loosening. the roller with thewrapped yarn is replaced by the other roller by rotating the disc toinsure continuity of operations.

4 Claims, 6 Drawing Figures PHENTEDWWIW? 3,666,154

sum 1 0F 3 An in");

@WWWWZ;

KINVU ISHIDA I YASUHtRO OKAMURA PATENTEBMM 30 1972 SHEET 2 BF 3 FIG? 'ATTORNEYS PATENTEDMAYB I972 3.666,154 sum 3 0F 3 FIGS INVENTORS W? M)ISHDA YASUHIRO OKAMURA BY fig/92 m ATTORNEYQ BROKEN YARN WINDINGAPPARATUS The present invention relates to improvements in a windingapparatus for broken yarns. It is the object of the inventionaccommodate a roller around which the yarn has wrapped itself during theoperation because of yarn breakage or loosening and remove the obstacleof the operations in the early stage.

When a number of filament yams or a number of tows in parallel rows aredrawn or subjected to other treatment, the yarns discharged from thelast process roller in the drawing apparatus are led to a subsequenttake-up apparatus. If any yarn is broken between this take-up apparatusand the process roller, it wraps itself on the process roller (i e.licking occurs). in order to remove the licking, the whole of theprocessing ap paratus must be suspended. If the wrapped yarn is leftadjacent running yarns giving rise to yarn breakage. Therefore any yarnwhich has wrapped itself around a roller should quickly be removed. Iflicking occurs frequently, the efficien cy of operations remarkablydiminishes.

And when filament yarns or tows are to be threaded from the last processroller in the drawing apparatus to the take-up apparatus, a suction gunis used for sucking each yarn or each tow and thereby taking up the yarnonto the rotating bobbin in the take-up apparatus. In this case, tensionbetween the last process roller and the take-up apparatus suddenlylowers, and the filament yarn or tow frequently wraps itself on the lastprocess roller, so that the efficiency of the apparatus also isdiminished.

In order to eliminate said defects of the winding apparatus as quicklyas possible, a rotatable disc on which two or more rollers (hereinaftercalled "relief rollers" to distinguish from the other rollers) aremounted is disposed between the last process roller and the take-upapparatus. It is desired to locate the relief rollers as near aspossible to the last process roller. In the present invention, the yarnswhich have left the last process roller are led to the take-up apparatusthrough relief rollers. When any yarn is broken or loosens between therelief rollers and the take-up apparatus, it wraps itself around one ofthe relief rollers. At this time, the winding operations are continuedby rotating the disc so as to replace the relief roller wrapped by theyarn with the other relief roller. The relief roller with the wrappedyarn is then set aside, and cleared of the yarn, and made ready for thefuture shifting for the other relief roller.

Hence continuity of the winding operations can be insured with thewinding apparatus in the present invention simply by usinginterchangeably the relief rollers when yarn breakage or looseningoccurs.

Further according to this invention a roller is preferably provided at afixed position between the last process roller and the relief rollers inthe same horizontal plane as the last process roller. This roller willbe referred to as a fixed roller" to distinguish from the other rollers.

Still further the winding apparatus in the present invention is sodesigned as to impart the lowest possible tension to the yarns by thespecial finish of the fixed roller surface and the difference inperipheral speed between the relief rollers and the fixed roller. Thusit is the main object of the present invention to make the yarn, whichis broken or loosened, wrapped itself around one of the relief rollersinstead of around the last process roller and thereby to prevent thediscontinuation of the operation, and increase the rate of production.

FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing an embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 2 and FIG. 3 are perspective views of the fixed roller.

FIG. 4 is a partial, vertical section of the relief roller in a rollersystem.

FIG. 5 is a front view of the relief roller as shown in FIG. 4.

FIG. 6 is a cross sectional view of one of the relief rollers.

One embodiment of the present invention will be described belowreferring to the drawings.

In FIG. 1 fixed roller 3 and relief rollers 5a and Sb mounted onrotatable disc 4 are disposed between last process roller 1 (such as adrawing roller in drawing apparatus) and take-up apparatus 20, 2b, 2c,and 2d. As shown in FIGS. 4 and 5, rotatable disc 4 is fitted withdriving main shaft 7 with gear 8 attached. It is desired that main shaft7 be fitted into disc 4 with bearing. Main shaft 7 is rotated by a powersource (not shown) to give a predetermined number of revolutions.

A guide 13 is spaced around disc 4, while handle 12 is provided on theperiphery of back plate 11 integral with and spaced behind said disc 4.Relief rollers 50 and 5b are supported by the shafts 5a and 5b whichpenetrate disc 4 and back plate 11 supported with bearings mountedthereon. Relief rollers Sa and 5b are rotated in the same direction bygears 9 and 10 attached to shafts 5a and 5b respectively, which meshwith gear 8 of main shaft 7. With such mechanism, it is possible toshift the position of roller 50 to that of roller 5b by rotating thedisc 4 with handle 12. Instead of the handle, a gear may be provided onthe periphery of the back plate II. This gear is engaged with anothergear (not shown), and the position of roller 50 is shifted to that ofroller 517 by rotating said another gear. Suppose that roller 5a is usedas a guide for the yarns and a broken yarn wraps on the roller 54. Thewrapped yarn would then cause entanglement with adjacent running yarns.However, disc 4 is rotated to replace roller 50 wrapped by broken yarnwith roller 5b. Then it is possible for the other yarns to continue torun, and roller 50 can be taken care of separately.

Fixed roller 3 is placed before disc 4 and may be rotated freely orpositively.

In FIG. 6, the back periphery of the relief roller is provided with anannular slot 59 in which one end of lever 60 is inserted with clearance.The other end of said lever 60 is fixed to the frame pivotably at 62 bymeans of a solenoid 6]. Mounted on the shaft 5a is a truncated cone,which when said roller 50 is allowed to move backwardly by a spring,comes into frictional engagement with a surface (a) of a hollow membersecured to the inner surface of the relief roller 5a. When said roller50 is moved forwardly by the lever 60, the cone is disengaged from thehollow member.

In FIG. I a number of filament yarns or tows 6a, 6b, 6c, and 6d treatedwith the processing apparatus, for instance a drawing device, pass underfixed roller 3 via last process roller 1, and are led to relief roller5a and taken up onto the bobbins in take-up apparatus 20, 2b, 2c and24'.

Suppose that a filament yarn 6a is led from process roller 1 to take-upapparatus 2a, and the tension of the yarn lowers. In the conventionalwinding apparatus, this loose yarn would wraps itself around roller 1.In such case, the whole operation must be suspended to remove thewrapping of the yarn and to thread it into the take-up apparatus. On theother hand, in the present invention when loose yarn 6a wraps itselfaround relief roller 50, relief roller 50 is shifted to the position ofroller 5b, and roller 5b occupies the position of roller 5a by way ofthe rotation of disc 4. Yarn 6a leaving the group of running yarnsthrough the position shifting of roller 5a does not affect the remainingyarns. Consequently, there is no need to suspend the running of theyarns, and the entangled yarn on roller 5a can be attended to outsidethe production line.

It is essential that relief rollers 50 and 5b are positively rotated. Ifthey are allowed to rotate freely, the frictional resistance against theyarn increases, tension at the time of the string-up decreases, andlicking deteriorates. In order to prevent licking on the process rollerwhen the yarn has been loosened, it is preferred that the peripheralspeed of roller 50 or 5!: be slightly higher than that of the processroller and the yarn tension between the two thus be increased. Furtherto insure the wrapping of yarn around one of the relief rollers, acontact angle of yarn with the relief rollers is preferably or above.The above is an embodiment using two interchangeable rollers, but therollers are not limited thereto. Three or more may be employed.

As mentioned above, the surface of fixed roller 3 coming in contact withthe yarn is coarsely finished by blasting an abrasive against thesurface of the roller, and its peripheral speed is lower than that ofthe relief roller. In order to fully effect the functioning of windingdevice in the present invention, any broken or loose end should alwayswrap itself around one of the relief rollers instead of the otherrollers. In order that yarn may wrap itself around either one of therelief rollers, it is necessary that there be yarn tension between fixedroller 3 and the relief roller 50 or b kept at a certain value(depending upon the form of product). The above tension lies betweenfixed roller 3 and the relief roller (hereinafter called T,), but asimilar tension is seen between process roller 1 and fixed roller 3(hereinafter called T,). In like manner, yarn tension between the reliefroller and the take-up apparatus is called T In the present invention T,is most important, but T and T, should be taken into considerationtogether with T To give 1 2 to the yarn, it is indispensable that therebe yarn tension between the last process roller and the take-upapparatus, which can be generated by making greater the peripheral speedof the take-up mechanism than that of the last process roller. Betweenthose rollers are disposed the fixed and relief rollers, and in view ofthe friction between the yarn and those rollers, T T,, and T becomepossible. If said friction is not present, yarn tension will take aspecified value and differences among T T and T will disappear The aboveis a description of yarn tension at the time when a broken end wrapsaround the relief roller. If this yarn tension is discussed in the lightof yarn quality such as dyeability and fuzzing, it is undesirable toimpart a high tension to the yarn after drawing, heat-setting, or otherprocessings, and the lowest possible yarn tension (T,, T,, and T betweenthe last process roller and the take-up apparatus is desirable However,T must have a minimum value sufficient to insure that any broken orloose yarn wraps itself around the relief roller. For this reason T hasto have a specified value. But as T, is determined relative to T,, T ispreferably as low as possible. In other words, with a smaller T thenecessary value of T can be lowered.

To meet the above requirements, the surface of fixed roller 3 iscoarsely finished (See FIG. 2.) or the diameter of fixed roller 3, isarranged to be smaller than that of the relief rollers (See FIG. 3.).The friction coefficient between yarn and a metallic roller isexperimentally known as being the smallest with a roller having coarselyfinished surface (Roughness is 5 to ll 8.). Thus if the frictioncoefficient is small, and T is small, the yarn easily wraps itselfaround the relief roller even under smaller T tension. If the diameterof fixed roller 3 is smaller than that of the relief roller and therebythe peripheral speed of the latter roller is made slightly greater thanthat of the former roller, T, is smaller than T,. In the same way aswith the coarsely finished roller, the yarn wraps itself easily aroundthe relief roller.

As stated above, in the present invention all the broken ends or looseyarns in the winding apparatus holding a great number of yarns areadapted to be wound onto the relief roller. Without effecting otheradjacent running yams, the entangled yam can be removed. Thus waste yarnat the time of string-up is slight and overall efficiency of the windingdevice is enhanced.

We claim:

1. A broken yarn winding apparatus positioned between a processingapparatus for treating a plurality of parallel yarns and a take-upapparatus for winding said plurality of yarns, said broken yarn windingapparatus comprising a fixed roller mounted after said processingapparatus, a rotatable disc disposed between said fixed roller and saidtake-up apparatus, at least two relief rollers mounted on said disc andextending therefrom transversely of the direction of movement of saidyarns, one of said relief rollers adapted to be engaged by said yarns,means for positively rotating said relief rollers about the axes thereofwith respect to said disc; and means for rotating said disc, wherebywhen one of said yarns becomes tangled around said one relief roller,said one relief roller is moved out of contact with the remainder ofsaid yarns and another of said relief rollers is brought into engagementwith said remainder of said yarns.

2. A broken yarn winding apparatus as claimed in claim 1,

wherein the surface of said fixed roller is coarsely finished.

3. A broken yarn apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein said fixedroller is rotatable such that the peripheral speed thereof is less thanthe peripheral speed of said relief rollers.

4. A broken yarn apparatus as claimed in claim 1, further comprising ashaft mounting each of said relief rollers on said disc, and means forlongitudinally moving said relief rollers along said shafts forengagement and disengagement therewith.

1. A broken yarn winding apparatus positioned between a processingapparatus for treating a plurality of parallel yarns and a take-upapparatus for winding said plurality of yarns, said broken yarn windingapparatus comprising a fixed roller mounted after said processingapparatus, a rotatable disc disposed between said fixed roller and saidtake-up apparatus, at least two relief rollers mounted on said disc andextending therefrom transversely of the direction of movement of saidyarns, one of said relief rollers adapted to be engaged by said yarns,means for positively rotating said relief rollers about the axes thereofwith respect to said disc; and means for rotating said disc, wherebywhen one of said yarns becomes tangled around said one relief roller,said one relief roller is moved out of contact with the remainder ofsaid yarns and another of said relief rollers is brought into engagementwith said remainder of said yarns.
 2. A broken yarn winding apparatus asclaimed in claim 1, wherein the surface of said fixed roller is coarselyfinished.
 3. A broken yarn apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein saidfixed roller is rotatable such that the peripheral speed thereof is lessthan the peripheral speed of said relief rollers.
 4. A broken yarnapparatus as claimed in claim 1, further comprising a shaft mountingeach of said relief rollers on said disc, and means for longitudinallymoving said relief rollers along said shafts for engagement anddisengagement therewith.